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Knockouts of The Night

The Ultimate Fighting Championship began its custom of awarding fighter bonuses for Fight of the Night, Knockout of the Night and Submission of the Night honors in October 2006, at the Tito Ortiz versus Ken Shamrock 3 live special on free cable. That night, Tito Ortiz picked up a cool $30,000 for once again blasting out Ken Shamrock in one round to take the Knockout of the Night award. Since that time, the UFC has regularly awarded its Knockout of the Night honors, alongside Fight of the Night and Submission of the Night awards, at the post-fight press conferences following each event. UFC frontman Dana White traditionally bestows the awards - one in each category, though exceptions are not unusual - based on his opinion of the fights, and without any formal judging criteria. The monetary awards provide an incentive for fighters to look for the finish, and honor the night's best performances. The UFC has given out well over $1,000,000 in post-fight awards to date, and the amounts of the awards have, with occasional exceptions, generally increased over time.

Out of a total of 64 UFC Knockout of the Night awards given out from October 2006 through August 2010, inclusive, 19 were given to preliminary card fights (30%), 31 were given to televised main card fights excluding main events (48%), and 14 were given to main events (22%). UFC 76 and UFC 118 each featured no knockouts, so no award was given. No award was given at UFC 73 or The Ultimate Fighter 9 Finale, either, even though each featured a single KO/TKO finish. The UFC on Versus 1 fight card featured an unprecedented three Knockouts of the Night, netting fight winners John Howard, Junior dos Santos and Jonny "Bones" Jones $50,000 each for their first round finishes.

Those 64 Knockout of the Night awards have been bestowed across the five UFC weight classes, plus catchweight bouts, as follows: lightweight, 7 (11%); welterweight, 11 (17%); middleweight, 13 (20%); light heavyweight, 18 (28%); heavyweight, 12 (19%); catchweight, 3 (4%). While the heavier weight classes dominate the Knockout of the Night awards (understandably, as they deliver a higher percentage of knockouts), the lighter weight classes tend to deliver the most Fight of the Night awards.

The Knockout of the Night awards tend to be evenly distributed, with few fighters gaining the award even twice. All-time great Anderson Silva, for example, has taken home only two KO of the Night bonuses (against Rich Franklin in their UFC 77 rematch, and against Forest Griffin at UFC 101), the same number as up-and-comer Denis Siver. The great Chuck Liddell, despite finishing a remarkable ten fights by knockout in the Octagon, never won Knockout of the Night. But he has the ignominious distintinction of being victimized the most times for Knockout of the Night awards, with four; his KOs at the hands of Quinton Jackson, Rashad Evans, Mauricio Rua and Rich Franklin lined their pockets to the tune of $40,000, $60,000, $70,000 and $85,000, respectively.